I’ll be screwed. The wife and I live in a precint which normally has a 70% turn out, the wait is typicaly and hour or so. It will probably be near 90% this time around, listening to my neighbors and such. I tried to get my wife to handle the business while I voted, and would do the same for her, but going to the polling place together (a very nice walk down a tree lined street, with wine and other stuff later 
) has become something of a traditiion. So I figure I’ll leave to vote at 4 and get home at 6ish.
So do we. The way I see it, at least there’s a paper trail!
Just voted. In Florida. Took forty minutes, including the walk to and from. Polling place is at my kids’ school. 100% of the kids I passed by (twenty or so) told me to vote for Kerry. Ballot was the kind I’m used to, ink in a circle and feed it through a machine. No problems at all. For comparison purposes, my wife voted early on Saturday. Four hours, hot weather, she didn’t see anyone leave. People in Florida aren’t leaving it up to chance this year.
Voted touchscreen in Florida.
No problem. One hour from start to finish. The poll workers were very kind, helping to keep the line moving, directing people where to stand, even chasing one woman down who left the booth without pressing the big red flashing “VOTE” button on the top of the monitor.
I feel better now. No matter how this turns out, I did everything I could.
I got to the polling place this morning, only to discover that they have no record of my registration. This is the first general election since I moved to my current apartment, but I changed my registration back in February, before the primary. (No, I didn’t vote in the primary – I stupidly left it until after work, but then got stuck in some stupid unnecessary emergency or another and got home after the polls closed. But the primary here wasn’t terribly hotly contested anyway.) I never got my card in the mail with the ward/precinct and polling place information, but that’s happened before and has never posed a problem.
After I threw a polite hissy-fit, they gave me a provisional ballot (they wouldn’t accept the proof of address that I had; my driver’s license still has the old address on it, which is only half a mile away, but I also had mail addressed to me at the new address – last week’s pay stub. I don’t understand this – after all, the mail and the old license are all I would need to get a new license, so why won’t they accept it?) This apparently means I can only vote for Federal office, which was obviously my main concern, but I am still really pissed off. Where did my new registration disappear to? Why did I do it at a walk-in table at a cafe near my house, rather than having my mom, the deputy registrar, do it? (Mostly because Mom is horribly disorganized and I thought she would lose it, but we all see how far this seems to have gotten me.) Also, I didn’t see that my provisional ballot was marked or handled differently than any other ballot, so then how exactly is it provisional? I’m confused.
I feel completely helpless and semi-disenfranchised. Also, I left a 1 lb. package of roasted almonds that was in my bag somewhere along the way this morning – I hope I left it at home rather than in the voting booth. It’s very unlike me to completely lose track of things like that.
Very strange. I also live in Fairfax County and didn’t have that problem.
I would just like to report that there was not a single problem for me or as far as I could tell for anyone else at my polling place. Then again, I live in California where it just deosn’t feel as vital (read: not a swing state).
In CA, all registered voters get a lot of ballot stuff in the mail, regardless of whether you’re voting absentee or not. Sample ballot, voter info packet, etc. Isn’t this also true where you live? If so, you migiht have become suspicious about not having gotten any at your new address.
Oh no! He would have loved that! THe most infuriating response would have been to laugh merrily and say something like “Yeah, it’s just killin’ ya, ain’t it?”
I’m in the same state as Eva but not the same county, and I can fairly confidently say that in the several years I’ve lived here, I’ve only seen the registration cards and nothing else from the election committee/board/whatever. I’ve also not received the cards previously and been able to vote.
Voted last week–Oregon’s an all-mail state.
Yeah I suppose a “suck it pube boy, Bush bitch is going down, mwahahaha!” would have been more appropriate.
This does not seem to be the norm in other states. All I get in New York is a card telling me where my polling place is. I’ve got to do my own research to find out what’s on the ballot.
I’ve been registered in Illinois since I turned 18 (which is longer than I care to think about), and have never gotten anything in the mail from the Cook County Board of Elections other than the voter registration card. Here in IL we have to do our own homework.
The old machines have to be the most reliable voting system, don’ t they?
It seems to me that tampering with them would be difficult. How would you do it, stick another gear in there or something? I wish these were universal, since they seem to be the most reliable, IMHO
MSNBC wants to hear about your troubles voting. 866-MYVOTE1.
They’re compiling errors on a map and keeping it updated real-time. Not surprizingly, Florida is in the lead with per-capita complaints.
-lv
Maybe it’s because we usually have 8 million ballot initiatives in every election and if people didn’t have a chance to figure things out in advance, it would take people 2 hours in the voting booth.
So do we!
We got our cards and then we got umpteen pieces of junk mail from each of the local candidaqtes- even some of who who were running unopposed.
Yes, but some first-time voters still have trouble. Though trying to close the curtains manually is kind of cute to watch.